Anti-people minimum

Rosneft shares are offered to the public for no less than 20 thousand rubles

As Rosneft President Sergei Bogdanchikov promised Vladimir Putin in April, almost all citizens will be able to buy Rosneft shares at Sberbank as part of the upcoming initial offering in July. Tomorrow, all information materials for individuals wishing to purchase these securities will appear in the branches of Sberbank, Gazprombank, Uralsib, the All-Russian Regional Development Bank (RRDB, the controlling stake belongs to Rosneft) and the Aton investment group. However, representatives of these banks, with whom Vremya Novostei correspondents were able to talk, assured yesterday that applications would be accepted for a minimum amount of 20 thousand rubles. -- this figure appears in internal documents of organizations. At the same time, RRDB does not intend to work with clients who are willing to spend less than 3 million rubles. Meanwhile, the minimum amount for which shares of the company can be purchased has not yet been established; serious debate on this issue continues in the government. Moreover, the parameters of the IPO have not yet been agreed upon; all necessary decisions are expected to be made at meetings of the board of directors of the oil company, which will be held on June 23 and July 13.

Advertising booklets about the sale of Rosneft shares in Sberbank appeared last Friday. The brochures indicate that applications from citizens to purchase shares will be accepted from June 26 to July 10. But with a caveat: “We warn you that the deadline for accepting applications may be changed.” The booklet also states that an application form for the purchase of Rosneft shares can be obtained from branches of authorized banks: “Fill it out, indicating the amount of funds for which you want to purchase shares. Please deposit money to pay." The materials do not say a word about the minimum contribution threshold. “Come to the bank. Fill out the application. Deposit funds. Become a shareholder! - the booklet calls. How many shares buyers will receive for 20 thousand rubles will be determined three days after the deadline for accepting applications. “The bank, within five working days after determining the price for one share, will calculate the number of shares you purchased and issue supporting documents,” says Sberbank materials. However, even if one share is inexpensive, at the “threshold” of 20 thousand rubles. placement is unlikely to become popular.

However, yesterday it was not possible to obtain the form that needs to be filled out at any of the bank branches. According to their representatives, they have not yet received it. At the same time, in the departments of each bank that will work with individuals wishing to become owners of Rosneft, Vremya Novostei was told that the application amount must be at least 20 thousand rubles. and these instructions came from Rosneft. So, in particular, they said yesterday at the Sberbank branch on Nikitsky Boulevard in Moscow and at the Sberbank office on Bolshaya Andronyevskaya, at Aton Line, Gazprombank and Uralsib. The only exception is RRDB, whose price threshold is significantly higher - it intends to service transactions of at least 3 million rubles.

Rosneft denies the information that banks provide to their clients. “This issue has not yet been resolved; the final minimum purchase amount will be determined in the near future,” said a representative of the state holding. Sberbank President Andrey Kazmin, quoted by Interfax, confirmed that the minimum payment will be determined by Rosneft itself. However, he denied the information that the bank had set the minimum application amount at 20 thousand rubles. However, experts do not rule out that this issue was still discussed with Sberbank. After all, for individuals, the bank’s services for purchasing shares are free. But he receives a commission from the seller, the state represented by Rosneftegaz, and its size should not be higher than the operating costs that the bank will incur when processing transactions. If there are many people willing to buy Rosneft shares, then operating costs will seriously increase, which need to be compensated, and then selling shares to the public will no longer be profitable for the seller. It is not profitable for other banks to sell shares of an oil company to a large number of clients also for reasons of saving on operating costs.

Experts believe that, by and large, it is not beneficial for anyone to place Rosneft shares “to the people.” First of all, Rosneft. “After all, shareholders must manage the enterprise,” one of the major Russian specialists in corporate law told Vremya Novostei, “and if you sell shares to every grandmother in every village, then she will only wait for dividends on the savings book, and not vote at shareholder meetings , do not participate in investment activities. For companies, such shareholders only cause headaches and a lot of operating costs for printing and mailing documents.” And without advertising of Rosneft shares, “they will be bought by those who should, that is, professionals,” believes Alexander Krapivenko, senior portfolio manager at Alfa Capital.

However, against the backdrop of falling global stock markets, investors are wary of Rosneft. According to The Financial Times, Mark Mobius, director of the investment fund Franklin Templeton Asset Management, which operates in emerging markets and manages $30 billion in assets, said: “If you asked me today if I was interested (in purchasing Rosneft shares.” Ed. ), then I would answer “no”. When emerging markets are falling at such a rate, it is very unlikely that Rosneft will be able to raise the funds it counted on a week ago.”

In turn, the South China Morning Post, citing a source in Sinopec, reports that Rosneft has made an offer to the Chinese company to purchase part of its shares during an IPO on the London Stock Exchange. “They want us to make a decision within two weeks in order to meet the placement schedule. We are interested in considering their proposal, but they have not indicated what market capitalization they are looking for, so we do not yet have a basis for negotiations. When Sinopec was listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, ExxonMobil, BP, Royal Dutch Shell and ABB bought its shares because they had specific cooperation projects. I cannot say that Sinopec has any such relationship with Rosneft. Political and country risks also need to be considered,” says the source. It was previously reported that Sinopec, together with Rosneft, are bidding to purchase Udmurtneft, owned by TNK-BP. Mr. Bogdanchikov also announced his intention to invite another Chinese company, CNPC, to participate in the IPO, but not as a strategic investor, but “on the same terms as other” buyers.

In general, as the head of the Ministry of Economic Development German Gref concluded yesterday, after the IPO the state will own more than 70% of Rosneft shares. So, given that during the consolidation of the company more than 11% of the shares will go to the minority shareholders of the subsidiaries, the share of the population will not account for such a large number of Rosneft securities. If, of course, these papers turn out to be in demand at all. After all, the average salary in Russia in April was, according to Rosstat, 9.9 thousand rubles.

Denis REBROV, Nikolay KOCHELYAGIN